


Come back home, William Schofield

by Flowergum (omeletdufromage258)



Category: 1917 (Movie 2019)
Genre: Character Study, M/M, Mentions of War, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-26
Updated: 2020-01-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:28:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22415494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/omeletdufromage258/pseuds/Flowergum
Summary: When war became everything you saw and knew, hope was something you stopped believing in. But even to the most hopeless of people, hope could arrive in the form of a person.William Schofield, who was feeling lost and discouraged, learned he was no exception. And as he started to feel that what he once used to call home could no longer be his, he realized he still had someone else, found amidst the lands of war. If only for now.
Relationships: Lance Corporal Schofield/Lance Corporal Blake, William Schofield/Original Female Character(s), William Schofield/Tom Blake
Comments: 5
Kudos: 69





	Come back home, William Schofield

“Come back to us.”

William Schofield had the same four words repeating inside his head like a worn-out prayer as he sat in the cabin of the train carrying him towards war territory again. He was coming back from his one-week-long permissionnaire, and even though most of the squaddies of the army would be happy to get their leaves of absent, Will learned he’d rather not ever come back home.

He had been back home for a whole seven days, a long leave due to that medal awarded to him. Though he couldn’t care less about the fucking recognition, he was thankful it got him to return home. And the first two days, he did feel blessed, all thoughts of the horrors of the war having temporarily left his mind and body.

He dedicated himself every waking minute of the days to be the father he couldn’t be the rest of the year. There was no Lance Corporal, just Will, loving every second he was with his baby girls.

But as the hours started to tick by and the days ended too soon, and the end of the week started to approach, William Schofield realized he couldn’t pretend that the past two years hadn’t happened. That he was a soldier, no room for parenthood once he returned to the gruesome reality of warfare. He realized that sooner, he’d have to say goodbye again to his daughters. He’d have to head back to a war that would have hold of his life until… until whichever end came.

His leave then became a ticking time bomb, and he dreaded the moment when he’d have to say goodbye to a life that could never be his while this bloody war lasted. How could he enjoy that?

“I don’t want you to leave”, Marion said one night to him, once their kids were fast asleep and darkness befell upon them. “We miss you here. Marie and Sally miss you so much, and it’s become so… hard.”

It hurt Will to hear that. It hurt him, because he didn’t want to be the type of father who would miss the growth of his children. The type of father that, god _forbid_ , might be absent forever.

He didn’t like to think about it, an ironic feat considering every other day of what became his life, he was met with the constant possibility of it happening. But war was impossible to escape. And one such as the Great War, with the biggest destruction and length mankind had ever seen so far, with such massive worldwide effects… How could Will promise he’d come back, that he wouldn’t go and leave them, when the future ahead of him was filled with uncertainty and death?

“You think I want to go there? You think I’d rather go to war, where I might just die? Where I will become something that haunts me every night?”

“I know! But–”

“–I CAN’T, MARION! … I just _can’t_ …”

Marion stopped talking. She wasn’t one to argue back to something like that. It also hurt her, and like most people, like most wives whose husbands left to war, she felt hopeless and scared. She kissed him on the cheek and whispered a soft ‘sorry’ to Will. Then she turned around in bed, her back facing him as she pretended to go to sleep. But her body trembled, and despite how much she tried to muffle her sobbing, William heard her. And he couldn’t comfort her. He couldn’t reach out.

Her muffled weeping became a sound worse than that of a gunshot being fired right in front of him, more so than a bomb landing a few yards ahead of him. And after that night, it happened time and again for the remainder of the week. Will ended up abandoning his bed every night, unable to sleep with his wife, unable to give her what he should have and making the most of his short time home.

That first night he went to sleep on the couch on the lounge. It was so quiet, so dead silent. William thought it would comfort him. It was always better the silence of home than the silence of the trenches, of enemy territory, of foreign lands that meant nothing to him. But when Will closed his eyes, he felt like he was back at war, and the silence morphed into a cacophony of anguished shrieks that made him open his eyes all at once.

Will promised to himself that he would not think of anything war-related when he was back home, just as he didn’t think of home back at war. But the nightmares were something that were out of his control. It was that fear, perhaps, that made him think of someone he dared not to name out loud, whenever he was far away from the battlefield.

Tom Blake.

William imagined the bloke in front of him, idly chatting about anything, smiling even as they were surrounded by death all around them. He almost believed he heard him saying one of his lewd remarks, and he felt his heart warming up. He despised himself for that. He felt guilty, as he felt comforted by a man who was miles and miles away, instead of by his sleeping wife at the other side of the house. He felt frightened, to think about Blake, not knowing if he’d be there when he came back. But the thought of him calmed him, even as his mind turned into a mess of thoughts that never quieted.

It was that one face, of a man who had to become one too fast too soon, but that even despite of that, had this joviality and youth that almost seemed out of place in the field of war, that accompanied him for the rest of his leave.

He calmed William’s anxiety to come back, lulling him into a dream-like reality where there were no nightmares. He became the prayer of every night, the light in the darkened house at night-time. And even though Will was so emotionally exhausted by the end of the week, when he had to say goodbye to his family once again and face his true reality, the cold, gruesome world ridden by blood and war, he didn’t feel as unprepared as he did before.

He kissed his two daughters goodbye, not daring to think it might be the last time, and bid his wife farewell, embracing her smaller body in his arms and inhaling the scent he was once so used to.

Not once the thought of his friend, waiting for him back at France, where the soil was poisoned and dead, where the trenches were the only hope of hiding from death for just a bit longer, left his mind. He didn’t want to think of how much he dreaded coming back again to uncertainty and destruction. He didn’t want to think that he had to leave his children and this quiet life to go back to that. And as Blake’s voice calmed his distressed mind, he tried, almost succeeding, not to think about the biggest incertitude and fear of them all. He did not want to think he may not find him there.

Marion held onto him tighter, and William felt her wet cheek in his neck, bringing him back to a present that almost felt someone else’s.

“I know this is not what you want”, she murmured in his ear, only meant for him to hear, “but please, for our daughters…”

She left the sentence open and pulled back and away from him. She took Mary and Sally by the hands, the little girls still drowsy from having just woken up and innocently unaware of the entire situation. Then, Marion finally looked at her husband in the eye.

William felt that guilt that had been there from the beginning as he thought of another person, a man, a soldier, quieting the other horrors in his head. But Marion was no fool. And she married him, knowing things that were never to be out. It was the best for her, and it was the best for Will. But she had children now, two small beings that became her everything, and the world seemed like it was ending. She was scared, concerned for her babies’ safety, and terrified for her husband’s life, a man who before all was her most cherished friend.

A friend going off to war.

So, she came closer, picking up Mary and cradling her in her arms, her sleepy eyelids closing almost completely, and pulled Sally closer to her side. Not once did Marion ever looked away from the hollow, red-rimmed eyes of Will.

Marion looked at her daughter at her side, and then at the one close to her chest. “…for them,” she said in a thin, weak voice, and her eyes rested on him again, “please come back to us.”

It was a wishful, naïve request. But sometimes the world run on hope. Sometimes, the world felt like it was filled with love and so, so much hope. It was that simple but strong feeling that made William less frightened and sorrowful.

He kissed the tops of their heads and caressed the cheek of his wife. He nodded once, afraid of saying a word out loud, and Marion smiled at him as her eyes welled up with tears.

It was as sad as goodbyes went, but unsatisfactory as a farewell between a husband and wife should have gone. But for them, it was more than enough. Hope was enough, William thought, to keep them feeling assured.

But as he reached the train that would take him back to the Western Front in France, he realized, hope was a short sentiment, that spilled like cold water to wake him up to the gruesome reality. He knew it was an illusion, that Marion comprehended that one could not make such promises without the heart breaking and the soul splitting. But Marion could choose to believe that things could end up well for the time being. And for Maria and Sally, so young, hope was almost like a Christmas present in times like this. Marion could use that to calm them and hush their fears.

But William, he had no escape. He was going straight to a slaughterhouse. There was no hope whatsoever that could help him. If he believed to choose to hope, to think of a happy end where he’d come back to his family, he would die. He’d get poisoned by the fact he might not come back. It was a dangerous thing to hope when he was a soldier, meeting with death every night and day.

He sat in the cabin of the train, too small and hard for comfort but better than the narrow passages of the trenches, and infinitely cosier than the dirty-and-crammed-with-rats’ holes where they slept.

He watched through the window the landscape pass like a picture in colour, and the promise Marion asked him to make scorched too deep into his soul. The words were too cruel, and Will felt despondent and past hope. The scenery seemed to mock him, showing him what he’d miss, a serenity that was not real, a land that would soon expose to what it truly was. He looked one last time at the tin box where he kept the pictures of his family, peeking inside at the faces that he’d rather forget to feel less pain, and his face soaked with tears.

It was merciless, and it was too much. He closed the box and put it away in the inside breast pocket of his uniform, willing himself to forget all about it, even as he felt its weight in his chest like a second heart. It was hard and it hurt him. He bit his lips, thanking God that he was alone in the cabin, and closed his eyes, all hope abandoning his body.

But as his sight was met with black, and William expected the images of his nightmares to appear vividly inside his head, he was only met with a voice. A cheerful sound that didn’t belong in this world, a soft voice that soothed him and grounded him, despite the cruelty of the reality. A voice that not once left him in the whole week that passed.

William dared not to open his eyes again for the rest of the trip, hearing only the sound of that voice, guiding him, accompanying him, bringing him a peace that was even felt back home. He dozed off to sleep, and the voice never went away. He didn’t want to see the face it belonged to, afraid that it might be the last time he’d see it.

But as the train stopped at its journey’s end, and he had to open his eyes again and face the harsh, cold world, he dared to hope. He hoped against hope that he’d see the face that was at every step of the way with him. He wanted to see the real person, even if it was uncertain.

His boots squashed the muddy floor and the cold froze his bones, even if he had his uniform intact and dry. But he didn’t care as he searched through the faces of the soldiers, known and unknown, for one man. He signed in with his Warrant Officer, and then was ordered to go to the third line of the trenches, to settle in for tomorrow.

The reserve trench was quiet, as the day itself was calm and uneventful it seemed. Will went around asking some of the soldiers resting if they’d seen Blake. Some of them welcomed him back, others didn’t answer him at all, but none of them seemed to know where the bloke was.

Dread invaded his nerves and he closed his eyes, afraid one of his worst fears came true. But when he opened his eyes again, a few meters up there where the grass started to get taller and bursting with weeds, he saw a familiar face and frame, leaning on a single oak tree, away from the rest of the soldiers. His heart rate decreased, and he felt the air return to his lungs.

Will strode there and gulped, still uncertain if it was real or an illusion. But as he got closer to the tree, he saw the figure moving, and the man looked his way.

Sky blue eyes gazed at him, and the face lit up at recognition, seeming out of tone in comparison to the grey scenery surrounding them. He stood up, but before he even uttered a word, William embraced him in his arms in a tight hold.

“Oi, Scho, you alright?” he asked with worry in his tone, even as his arms hugged him back.

William held him for a few seconds longer, trying to memorize the weight against him, the heat of his body warming his soul and even the dirty, earthy scent of his friend, reeking of smoke and sweat, that was almost unpleasant if it weren’t because it was _real_. 

William pulled away then, and he properly looked at his friend. “Blake”, he said as the shorter man stared at him with a quizzical, concerned look. “Blake, I’m glad you’re here.”

He couldn’t say more, didn’t dare to. Hope was a dangerous thing, and William thought he had hoped too much already. But he realized, as Blake’s face broke into a grin and he patted his cheek for a second longer than necessary, that he didn’t need to say anymore.

“Aye, it would take a lot to take me down yet, Scho. And besides, who would get to make you company then?”

William chuckled, content that at least he could have that. That he could have Blake, and he decided to not think about anything else, if only for a moment.

He slid down the tree and sat against it, Blake doing the same. Will shut his eyes, listening to the quiet of a world that appeared to have paused. The grass waved around them, the wind blowing at its weeds, almost as if trying to rid it from the wild plants. Will inhaled, allowing his body to rest, and his nostril caught a spicy, aromatic fragrance. He hummed, pleased and calmed.

“Achillea Moonshine.”

“Huh?” Will slowly opened his eyes at the sound of Blake’s voice. He was staring ahead, at something in the grass. He nodded to it, and Will looked in that direction.

A plant with fernlike leaves and a cluster of bright yellow flat flowers sprouted from the grass, a few feet across them. It was beautiful, and it looked out of place. William looked back at Blake and smiled, rejoicing in the similarity.

“A Yarrow. My mum gave me and Joe one of those a few days before we set off. Said it’s the plants of the soldiers. She said a common name is soldier’s woundwort. And it was named after Achilles, who used it to cure his wounds in the Trojan Wars.”

“Incredible”, Will murmured as he stared at the way Blake’s eyes looked at the flower pensively, reminiscing better times for sure. Blake turned to look at him. He gave him a smirk.

“She also said it’s used in weddings, as an aphrodisiac.”

William laughed again a bit louder. He felt light, lighter than ever in his life.

“You don’t say, Blake.”

Blake’s chuckle reverberated in his head. He closed his eyes once more, leaning his head back in the trunk. The wind blew in his face and it almost felt dreamlike.

He stretched his arm and groped for Blake’s hand. When he found it, laying on the cold, wet grass, he took it in his, meeting no resistance. He felt his fingers being interlaced with Blake’s, and he let out another breath, inhaling again and smelling the yarrow. Blake moved closer to him, their shoulders brushing against each other, and Will breathed him in, feeling comforted.

This was the closest he could have to a dream free of horrors and dread. It was short, it would soon be over. And God knows if it could be his again. What he wished for run too dangerously on hope. It reminded him of his family back home. But somehow, it didn’t make him afraid. As the warmth of Blake’s hand and proximity soothed him, he decided to not think at all of what may not be.

For now, he had Blake, and the world didn’t scare him.

_Come back,_ William Schofield, _come back._

If only for a while, he did.

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry if there were any historical inaccuracies. Ever since I saw the movie, I wanted to write about Will and Blake, and this is what I came with.  
> Let me know what you thought or leave me a message if you want to cry with me about the movie T-T


End file.
